A couple have suffered a barrage of online abuse because they allowed their three-year-old to have a three-hour tattoo.

Carlisle based tattoo artist Wayne Fisher, 26, and his wife Jade, 29, are both adorned with numerous tattoos.

They are adamant that they wouldn't dream of giving their children permanent body art of any kind, though they were happy to let their daughter Jazmine to have a temporary tattoo.

Their friend Vicky McAdam, 48, gave the youngster a spray-on arm tattoo - part of a growing trend imported from the United States.

The decorations are strictly temporary, and easily washed off.

But when the story of Jazmine's short-lived tattoo was featured on a national newspaper's website, with a headline that failed to point out it was temporary, scores of people went online to comment.

The couple, from Stanwix, have been horrified that the thousands of online comments on social media have included hundreds that were viciously negative, with some suggesting people with tattoos are stupid.

“We don't even agree with allowing children to have their ears pierced,” said Wayne. “But this was a temporary tattoo.

“It was gone in a few hours.”

Jade, also a devoted stepmum to Bradley, seven, said the couple were invited as tattooed parents to travel to over to the North East so that Vicky could spray Jazmine's arm for a story about children who enjoy temporary tattoos that make them look like mum and dad.

Their visit, along with pictures of Jazmine sporting an arm covered in skull tattoos, was featured on a national newspaper website, triggering an avalanche of hurtful comments.

Jade said: “Vicky started her venture originally for parents who didn't want to go through having real tattooes but then she veered off into doing it for kids' birthday parties and celebrations.

“When we got there, Jazmine asked if she could have princesses sprayed on her arm but Vicky said she only had skulls.”

Confident that their daughter was happy to have the temporary tattoo offered, they allowed Vicky to go ahead and their daughter loved it – though within a few hours the image was gone.

“It was meant to be a bit of light-hearted fun,” said Jade.

Yet within hours of the story going online, readers were posting abusive and nasty comments, with one suggesting that “having a neck tattoo is one step up from having a lobotomy.”

Jade said: “Jazmine loved every second of it.“She idolises her mum and dad and we got some lovely pictures of her getting it done. Then we drove home.

“We went online and people who obviously hadn't read the full article started making comments, suggesting that we're terrible parents – and saying really hurtful things.

“One woman said I was the most unattractive woman she'd ever seen! I could understand it if we'd done something wrong. But we've all been to birthday parties and had our faces painted. This is no different.”

As for the skulls, Jade and Wayne said they are no different to the spooky artwork enjoyed by children at Halloween, or the charactes paraded on stage at Christmas pantos.

The story created such a media storm that the couple were invited to appear on ITV's Loose Women and on Good Morning Britain.

“We love our children and we're good parents,” added Jade.

“This whole thing has been taken completely out of context. Wayne is a talented man and I run my own business, a barbers, with my mum

“In that job I meet people from all walks of life: I cut the binman's hair, the lawyer's hair, a judge's hair, and they all see me as Jade, the mum, wife, and businesswoman. “Why should I be judged because I have tattoos?”

Wayne, who works at the Black Friers Tattoo House in Devonshire Street, Carlisle, said he and Jade, who married two weeks ago, are victim of a blind prejudice against people with tattooes.

He said: “There were supportive comments.

"But most of the negative stuff was from people of the older generations. Times have changed. People who have tattoos are simply expressing themselves with art on their body.”